Dumbarton Oaks Newsletters

The newsletter that you are reading, The Oaks News: A Monthly Bulletin from Dumbarton Oaks, is the latest in a succession of news bulletins dating back to 1941 that have been published at Dumbarton Oaks. The Oaks News had its first digital issue in February 2012 and continues to be published monthly for the staff, alumni, and friends of Dumbarton Oaks in order to inform them of the institution's varied activities in all departments. Copies of all newsletters, both historic and current and both in print and digital formats, are preserved in the Dumbarton Oaks Archives.

The Underworld Courier Vol. I, No. I (January 11, 1941)

The earliest newsletter, the Underworld Courier, was a private publication produced by Dumbarton Oaks staff to keep the founders, Mildred and Robert Woods Bliss, then residing in California, abreast of developments and happenings at the nascent research library and collection. Twenty-one issues were printed between January and November 1941.

Dumbarton Oaks Newsletter Vol. I, No. 1 (January 1979)

Between January 1979 and April 1982, nine issues of the Dumbarton Oaks Newsletter were produced for staff. The 1979 issues are interesting as they chronicle the ever-increasing need for library shelving space, a need that was never completely solved until the completion in 2005 of the Robert Venturi-designed library. As construction began to install third-floor shelving stacks in the Main House, the newsletter of January 1979 stated:

It’s estimated that the renovated third floor stacks, the compact shelving in the basement, together with shelving in the Reading Room, Reference Room, Catalogue Room, second floor halls and the Library offices, will accommodate close to 130,000 volumes. This will allow for a growth of approximately 40,000 volumes, which means that at the average annual growth rate of 2,500 volumes, the Byzantine Library Collection will have enough space for about sixteen years. As far as the future in concerned, we can safely predict that with new technologies, especially microform holdings of periodicals, more space can be obtained after the initial sixteen years’ growth will be used up. [Vol. I, no. 1 (January 1979)]

A hiatus in newsletter production occurred between 1982 and 1994, at which time the Byzantine Studies program began publishing its own digital newsletter, first annually and later intermittently until its last issue in January 2015. Similarly, the Garden and Landscape Studies program initiated Landscape Matters: News from GLS @ Dumbarton Oaks in 2008. This annual digital publication occurs each fall.

In the Know at D.O. Newsletter, Vol 1, No. 1 (July 2009)

In July 2009, the first institutional digital newsletter was launched, In the Know at D.O., which was issued monthly until February 2013.

And most recently, the Dumbarton Oaks Communications Manager began publishing a digital staff newsletter on April 14, 2017, the Director's Office Weekly Bulletin.